The Contagion is an Elusive Target Arcade contract in Hitman World of Assassination featuring Milla Jovovich as Lilith Devo, a cult leader and newly appointed CEO of Ether Corporation. The contract takes place on the Dartmoor map and consists of two levels, both of which can be completed with Silent Assassin ratings using straightforward approaches. Neither level introduces a particularly steep difficulty curve, making this one of the more approachable arcade contracts in the game.
Quick answer: Poison the glass of whiskey Lilith Devo eventually drinks in the main hall, then eliminate her in the downstairs bathroom once she gets sick — either by drowning (accident kill, no body hiding needed) or with the fiber wire (hide the body afterward).
Level 1 — Poison method with default loadout
You can complete the first level entirely with default equipment and items found on the map. No unlocked gear is required. The core strategy revolves around acquiring rat poison, tainting a drink Devo will eventually consume, and finishing her off in private once she retreats to the bathroom.
Step 1: From the starting point, head toward the manor and circle around the outside to the right. Before entering, pick up the crowbar near the side entrance — the door into the manor is locked, and you'll need it to get inside.
Step 2: Use the crowbar on the locked door, crouch, and close the door behind you on the left. Move through the lobby and enter the room on the right. Toss a coin to the far side of the room, then duck into the closet. A mansion staff member will come to investigate the noise.
Step 3: Equip the crowbar, exit the closet once the staff member enters, and knock him out. Stash his body in the closet and take his disguise. This outfit gives you enough access to move through the manor's ground floor.
Step 4: Head through the nearby bathroom. On the washing machine, you'll find rat poison — grab it. There's no lethal poison readily available on this map, but rat poison is all you need to lure Devo away from the crowd.
Step 5: Enter the main hall and locate the glass of whiskey that Devo will drink later in her routine. Poison it. At this point, you'll need to wait. Devo gives a speech, mingles with guests, and only approaches the drink after a significant delay. There's no way to speed this up in-game.
Step 6: While waiting, head upstairs to a second-floor NPC and knock him out. Take his disguise — it has only one enforcer on the entire map (the butler), making it extremely powerful for moving freely. You can also swap back to your suit to avoid enforcers altogether, though you'll need the better disguise for the next part.
Step 7: Once Devo drinks the poisoned whiskey, she'll clutch her stomach and head to the downstairs bathroom. Follow her there. You have two clean options for the kill. Drowning her counts as an accident kill, meaning you can leave the body where it falls with no penalty. Alternatively, using the fiber wire is faster, but you must hide the body in the bathroom afterward — guards will eventually patrol through and discover it otherwise.
Step 8: Head to the exit. Watch out for the butler, who is the sole enforcer for your current disguise. He patrols near the exit path and can catch you off guard if you're not paying attention. Once past him, run straight to the extraction point to complete Level 1.
Level 2 — Propane flask and breach charge method
The added complication for Level 2 is "avoid collateral damage by only eliminating your targets." In practice, this changes almost nothing if you were already going for Silent Assassin, since that rating already requires zero non-target kills. The real advantage of Level 2 is that you can use a much faster elimination method if you bring the right equipment.
Step 1: Set your starting location to the staff room and choose the mansion guard disguise. In your loadout, bring the Kalmer tranquilizer and a breach charge. No other items are necessary.
Step 2: Immediately after spawning, use the Kalmer to tranquilize the nearby male NPC, then shoot the maid with a second dart. Both will drop unconscious. Grab the male NPC's disguise and pick up the propane gas canister in the room.
Step 3: Carry the gas canister to the position near Devo's path. The key here is placement — you need to set the canister down and then drop the breach charge from your inventory directly next to it. Do not place the breach charge normally, as this will draw attention. Instead, hold the gas canister, open your inventory, highlight the breach charge, and use the "drop item" command (Triangle on PlayStation, Y on Xbox). This drops it discreetly without alerting anyone.
Step 4: Move away from the gas canister and breach charge, then detonate. The explosion will eliminate Devo as an accident kill. Make sure you're far enough away to avoid catching yourself in the blast radius.
Step 5: Head for the exit. A "body found" notification may appear for the NPC you took the disguise from, but because you used the tranquilizer rather than a lethal method, this does not void your Silent Assassin rating. Avoid the few enforcers scattered along the exit route — this particular disguise has some unpredictable enforcer placements — and extract.
Lilith Devo's story and the Patient Zero Requiem mission
The Contagion arcade contract draws from the broader Patient Zero Requiem storyline, which casts Milla Jovovich as Lilith Devo. In the narrative, Devo is the daughter of Oybec Nabazoff, the leader of a doomsday cult that Agent 47 previously dismantled in Thailand. She has infiltrated Ether Corporation and risen to CEO with the backing of Gregory Carlile, who owns the Carlile estate where the Dartmoor mission takes place.
Devo's true goal is to release a virus called Nightshade from a hidden underground laboratory beneath the estate. The lab is accessible via a secret passage that requires a Carlile family ring to open. An AI system named Herb manages the lab's containment protocols and initially refuses to let Devo breach the virus. The full Patient Zero Requiem mission involves navigating this underground section, dealing with Ether's quarantine lockdown, and ultimately stopping Devo from spreading the pathogen.
The Elusive Target Arcade version simplifies all of this into a straightforward assassination on the Dartmoor grounds, removing the underground lab sequence entirely. You only need to eliminate Devo at the fundraiser event.
Failure lockout and retry rules
If you fail either level of The Contagion arcade contract, the current lockout period is approximately 30 minutes before you can retry. This is a significant reduction from the original permanent-failure model that Elusive Targets used at launch, so there's less pressure to get everything perfect on the first attempt. That said, both levels are forgiving enough that most players should clear them without issue using either method described above.
The Contagion doesn't unlock any exclusive rewards or gear upon completion. It exists primarily as a way to experience the Milla Jovovich celebrity crossover content within the Elusive Target Arcade framework, which keeps it permanently accessible rather than limiting it to a timed window.